We won the General Secretary position by 1283 to 1279 (the first count had a 1279 -1279 draw) against the current Welfare Officer.The most satisfying part was that the BNP Youth leader got a miserable 100 odd votes and looked close to tears when we won with a real Bethnal Green moment.Most other positions were less close with the Labour Student lead “Book and Beer coalition” facing a backlash against their negative campaigning/ red baiting.The tides seem to be turning from when softer left candidates a few years ago lost lower profile elections with similar slate support.SOAS also elected a Socialist President and Respect is going into NUS conference with over 60 delegates.What a change from last year where we were wiped out in Manchester and only got a place on NUS “block of 12” through transfers from other groups. Next year we should actually be in a position where Socialists can show how we would run the student movement.

But it gets better last week a Union meeting of 450 discussed our “Another Education is Possible” motion to twin with Nablus and the Bolivarian Uni Of Venezuela.We lost a few early votes that gutted the motion (thanks to a very well organised opposition) but started to consistently win key votes about the nature of Israel on the floor.By the end we had enough influence to call for and win a position to vote down our own gutted and inverted motion.It is hard to explain what a victory it felt like having won a majority of fair trade activists to a pro-Palestinian position.

All that is left is to show that the left can run the Union in a principled and political way while bringing in more Union activists.